Don’t Make African Nations Borrow Money to Support Refugees

Poor countries have borne the brunt of the refugee crisis. Tanzania’s refusal to bear the cost of a new U.N. program is a warning to the West.

Burundian children, who fled their country, stand behind a fence as they wait to be registered as refugees at Nyarugusu camp, in north west of Tanzania, on June 11, 2015. (Stephanie Aglietti/AFP/Getty Images) 

BY ALEXANDER BETTS-

 FEBRUARY 21, 2018, 1:47 PM
The European refugee crisis has deluded many voters into believing that most refugees are coming to rich countries. They are not — 84 percent are in low- or middle-income nations. Tanzania is one such country; it hosts over 350,000 refugees mostly from Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo and has had a long-standing commitment to offering sanctuary to persecuted people, despite being among the poorest 30 countries in the world.

In contrast to other countries in the region such as Kenya, Tanzania’s reputation for hosting has been generally positive; it pioneered rural self-reliance programs for refugees under its founding president, Julius Nyerere, and offered naturalization to tens of thousands of Burundians under President Jakaya Kikwete from 2005 to 2015. Recently, though, it announced its withdrawal from the so-called Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework (CRRF), a centerpiece of the United Nations’ current reform plans for the refugee system. The CRRF is the operational pillar of a new U.N. Global Compact on Refugees, and one of its main aims is to better support refugee hosting countries like Tanzania, including through greater development assistance.

After months of discussions, Tanzanian President John Magufuli rejected a bill on the compact. The apparent sticking point was that the country would have to borrow money from the World Bank in order to support greater opportunities for refugees. As part of the bank’s annual lending window for poor countries, known as IDA18, Tanzania was offered $100 million, split between a loan and a grant. The idea that a country like Tanzania should have to borrow, even at preferential rates, to host refugees on behalf of the international community was roundly derided by Magufuli when he addressed foreign ambassadors in Dar es Salaam on Feb. 9. The government has been clear that it supports refugees but rejected the plan on principle because it wants rich countries to pay Tanzania rather than forcing it to borrow.

U.N. officials in Geneva and New York perceive the Tanzanian decision as an attempt by a nationalist leader to elicit more funding. But it is about much more than money. It is clear to me, having recently spoken with government officials and leaders of nongovernmental organizations, that Tanzania is a country committed to supporting refugees but which feels that international lenders and the United Nations have consistently let it down. The government worries about the security implications of small arms coming to the camps from Burundi and Congo, environmental degradation around the camps, and competition for resources. Above all, what stands out is a sense of historical injustice. Tanzania, having consistently upheld its end of the bargain, has been disappointed by donor states not delivering on their funding commitments.

Tanzania may be a small country, but its reaction has wider ramifications for the global refugee system.

Western leaders are especially focused on finding solutions for refugees in havens like Tanzania that are close to conflict zones. And yet, if donors are not even prepared to adequately fund them, there is a real risk that other host countries may follow suit.

Tanzania has been hosting refugees continuously since 1959. During the anti-colonial liberation wars of the 1960s and 1970s, Nyerere offered an open-door policy to hundreds of thousands of people fleeing southern African nations including South Africa and what was then Rhodesia. Tanzania’s government gave refugees access to land, making it one of the most progressive refugee-hosting countries in the world. But when Tanzania finally approached international donors for support to make this approach sustainable at the first and second International Conference on Assistance to Refugees in Africa in 1981 and 1984, major donor countries made pledges but failed to deliver. In the mid-1990s, when Tanzania received mass influxes from Burundi in 1993 and then more than 250,000 Rwandans in just a matter of days in 1994, it faced criticism for its forced repatriation of many Rwandans but received only limited support. In 2008, Tanzania announced that it would naturalize 162,000 Burundian refugees who arrived in 1972. Once again, commitments of international support went unfulfilled.

Today, less than 40 percent of the humanitarian budget for refugees in Tanzania is being met. Local concerns from district and regional commissioners in the border regions feature prominently on the radar of the government. In regions such as Kigoma, they have consistently expressed anxiety about the destabilizing effects of small arms and environmental degradation. In this context, and against the backdrop of history, it is understandable that the request to borrow money to implement a plan agreed far away in New York and largely delivered as a fait accompli feels like another bad deal.

Most of the other 12 countries involved in the CRRF rollout seem likely to stick with the process, but there are still broader lessons for refugee politics. Tanzania’s central message to international lenders is: Don’t be so arrogant as to believe you don’t have to build partnerships among equals. Inevitably, a fundamental feature of the refugee system is its glaring power asymmetry. Rich donors fund at their discretion, and poor countries in unstable regions face an international legal obligation to admit refugees. Unlike a growing number of rich countries, poor countries rarely shirk that responsibility or try to weasel out of it. Their willingness to offer sanctuary on their territory risks being taken for granted. Tanzania’s announcement is a reminder that if the refugee system is to be sustainable, distant donor states must listen more attentively to the concerns of host countries.

A new approach will require systemic improvements to the refugee system — beginning with more engaged humanitarian diplomacy, better political analysis to understand local and national interests, and more creative financing models.

The World Bank’s role in responding to refugee crises should be welcomed. But asking Tanzania to borrow in order to assist refugees is a mistake.

 Debt forgiveness would be a better way to support host states, especially given that structural adjustment programs and the accumulation of debt underlay Tanzania’s shift toward more restrictive refugee policies in the 1990s.

Elsewhere, partnerships have been built with major host countries based on mutual respect. In Jordan, for example, a combination of trade concessions from the European Union and loans and grants from the World Bank and bilateral donors led Jordanian politicians to make it easier for Syrian refugees to work.

If the rich world wants countries adjacent to conflict zones to continue hosting refugees, it needs to begin by recognizing that African politicians face the same constraints as their European or North American counterparts and that they cannot bear the financial burden of accepting refugees alone.

Facebook: Friend or foe to society?   

2018-03-23

The debate over social media regulation has reached a critical point, with the social media giant Facebook facing its biggest ever crisis in its 14 year history.

In Britain and the United States, investigations are being held to find out whether Facebook did enough to protect its users’ private data. This came after a probe by Britain’s Channel 4 television exposed that a London-based political consultancy firm, Cambridge Analytica, improperly accessed information on 50 million Facebook users to sway public opinion. Among its clients was Donald Trump during the campaign for the United States presidential election in 2016.  

With Facebook being boxed into a corner, the case for regulation is gaining momentum, in view of allegations that social media platforms are responsible for communal tensions in Sri Lanka, ethnic cleansing in Myanmar, racism and terrorism in Europe and the distortion of democracy in the United States and elsewhere.
Free speech advocates lambasted the Sri Lankan Government for blocking several social media platforms, including Facebook, WhatsApp and Viber, early this month as part of measures to curtail the spread of anti-Muslim violence. But the Government felt the week-long ban together with the imposition of the State of Emergency was a necessary evil. It appears that the Government seeks to follow the golden mean by not implementing a total ban on social media but acting on the premise -- as Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, despite his democracy-promoter credentials, says – that some regulation is required to obviate the negative effects of 
social media.

In a stricter sense, social media refer to social networking of groups or platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and Instagram to share content in the form of texts, images and videos. In a loose sense, social media can mean any interactive website and even web-based games such as Candy Crush, Pokemon Go and the highly controversial and dangerous Blue Whale challenges.

In a way limited regulation is warranted given the harm social media and internet pose to society at large. Social media breed social ills ranging from pornography and paedophelia to slavery, drug trade, racism and terrorism. With porn just a click away, children are exposed to adult material at the tender age of about 10, leading to the breakdown of society in the long run. A satanic world also exists within the World Wide Web, which was, paradoxically, hailed as the gateway to a knowledge-based society when it first made its presence felt.  Good and evil exist side by side.

  
What is scarier is that you are being watched.  Through your smart phones and even your smart television, information about you, your behaviour patterns and the websites you visit are harvested and relayed backed to device producers and marketers. The danger is more, if you are a social media user. Needless to say hackers have a field day. Our privacy has been seriously compromised. 

The cyber world is huge. It has been called the largest unregulated and uncontrolled domain in human history. There has been little international effort to adopt global standards on cyberethics. On the contrary, cybersecurity has been discussed extensively by nations as nuclear systems and strategic databases are hacked in uncontrolled cyberwars. Cyberethics receive little attention, even as the digital world scrambles to embrace Artificial Intelligence which will make wars and conflicts more inhumane. The growing demand for techno-species such as sexbots indicates that even relationships are becoming inhumane. 

Last month, addressing the Munich Security Conference, United Nations Secretary General António Guterres lamented over “the absence of consensus in the international community about how to regulate the so‑called Internet of things.”  But his remarks came largely in the context of cybersecurity instead of cyberethics. He said the multiplicity of activities — some by States, some by different actors, and even by amateurs — and the different uses that criminal organisations and terrorist organisations are making of the web create a level of threat that is becoming higher and higher and for which we have not yet found an adequate response.

Last week, UN investigators slammed the social media giant Facebook as a “beast”, for being a carrier of hate speech that led to possible genocide of the Rohingya in Myanmar. When questioned about hate speech posts of Myanmar’s ultra-racist groups such as Ma Ba Tha and 969, Facebook said it suspended and sometimes removed anyone that “consistently shares content promoting hate.”

“If a person consistently shares content promoting hate, we may take a range of actions such as temporarily suspending their ability to post and ultimately, removal of 
their account.”

But Facebook procedure is slow. Often, the harm is done before hate-speech posts are removed.  The so-called community standards Facebook is talking about in its defence are ineffective. This is evident in the rise of the far right in Europe. Facebook is the biggest culprit.

Self-regulation by social media companies does not work, as the events in Sri Lanka, Myanmar and elsewhere show. Democracies and authoritarian states alike block social media.

India regularly imposes internet blackouts whenever there are troubles in Kashmir. Pakistan bans social media during political unrests and when its requests for the removal of religiously sensitive material are ignored. In China, where Facebook remains blocked from 2009, the state decides on the access to social media.  Iran, North Korea, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Vietnam are among 18 nations that have blocked or temporarily restricted access to Facebook and other social media platforms to suppress political dissent or control protests.

True, social media enable families and friends to stay in touch. To their credit, social media have played a big role in ending dictatorships, as happened in Egypt. 

Governments cannot afford to block websites and social media, because e-commerce is a digital era reality. Also the cyber anarchists are one-step ahead of state authorities and regulations and keep devising various apps to circumvent blocks and bans.

Given the vastness of the social media, regulating them is a terabyte task.  Yet, it will do a world of a good if companies such as Facebook and Twitter enhance self-regulation and make it effective. On Wednesday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg apologised for making mistakes that led to millions of Facebook users having their data exploited by Cambridge Analytica.  The same Zuckerberg had earlier dismissed as “pretty crazy idea” reports that claimed fake news on Facebook influenced the US presidential election in favour of Trump. Facebook’s role in alleged Russian interference in the US presidential election is being investigated by Special Investigator Robert Mueller.  The controversy has generated congressional moves to bring legislation to control political ads on social media.

Instead of apologies, what is required is the adoption by social media companies of high ethical standards to combat hate-speech, racism, pornography, terrorism and political manipulation that distorts democracy. In this context, an international covenant on cyberethics is indeed in order.  We are not advocating an infringement of the freedom of expression. This freedom is, in any case, not absolute. We only underscore that freedom comes with responsibility. 

Racism used for ‘divide and rule’ in Malaysia, says report

The Putra Mosque in Putrajaya, Malaysia. Source: Pixabay

By Max Walden | 23rd March 2018

MALAYSIA’S government is utilising racism as a tool to “divide and rule” the country, according to a damning new report from a local human rights organisation.

Pusat KOMAS released the Malaysia Racial Discrimination Report on Wednesday, tracking what it said were increased instances of racism recorded in the media during 2017 in the multicultural, Muslim-majority Southeast Asian nation.

Malaysia has long dealt with racial and religious tensions between its Malay majority and sizeable ethnic Chinese and Indian communities. The ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) has for decades provided economic advantages to Muslim Malays to the exclusion of minorities.

SEE ALSO: Malaysian laundry washes hands of non-Muslims, but denies being racist

With the country’s 14th General Election expected sometime in the coming months, the Pusat KOMAS report argued that “racism has become more pronounced and is being increasingly used as a tool to divide and rule.”

Performers dance during the 60th Merdeka Day (Independence Day) celebrations in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Aug 31, 2017. Source: Reuters/Lai Seng Sin

It cites “entrenched racism among Malaysians” and rising “religious extremism” as factors in the rise of discriminatory actions. Pusat KOMAS said greater numbers of discrimination cases highlights the “inherent danger of the overreach of bureaucratic Islamic institution[s].”

While since 2010 Prime Minister Najib Razak’s government has run the 1Malaysia program aimed at emphasising the country’s ethnic harmony and national unity, it has refused to implement anti-discrimination laws because, as he has claimed, “unity is in a good and controlled state”.

Racial discrimination is practiced widely by certain groups and agencies including being “prevalent in the Malaysian property market” said Pusat KOMAS, with perpetrators never dealt with by authorities.

“Lack of action by the authorities has allowed these groups to continue damaging the nation’s national unity and social cohesion,” it said.

Pusat KOMAS pointed to a range of localised cases of racism, including a ‘Muslim only’ public toilet and laundromats, separate drinking cups issued for Muslim and non-Muslim students at a school, as well as a hotel chain’s policy of forbidding women to wear headscarves at work.

A controversial ‘blackface’ advertising campaign run by Watson’s Malaysia during Ramadan 2017. Source: Facebook

There were nevertheless leaders who pushed back against racism and religious discrimination, noted the report, including the Sultan of Johor who ordered Muslim-only businesses to open themselves to all or shut down.

SEE ALSO: Malaysian sues over flag mistaken for US one ‘desecrated with ISIS symbols’

The Malaysian Armed Forces also announced its intention to recruit different races to the military in 2017, aiming to increase non-Malay participation by 10 percent annually. The country’s civil service of some 1.3 million people remains dominated by ethnic Malays.

While 179 countries have ratified the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), Malaysia is not one of them.

“Malaysian political and public leaders should step up their efforts to demonstrate an unequivocal political will and commitment in overcoming racism,” said Rita Izsák-Ndiaye, a former UN Special Rapporteur on minority rights issues.

She said Malaysian leaders should take swift action against “hate speech and any acts of incitement to hatred and should join the ICERD family without delay.”

Nature's 'alarming' decline threatens food, water, energy: U.N.

FILE PHOTO: A boy looks for plastic bottles at the polluted Bagmati River in Kathmandu March 22, 2013. REUTERS/Navesh Chitrakar/File Photo

Alister Doyle-MARCH 23, 2018

OSLO (Reuters) - Human activities are causing an alarming decline in the variety of plant and animal life on Earth and jeopardizing food, clean water and energy supplies, a U.N.-backed study of biodiversity said on Friday.

Climate change will become a steadily bigger threat to biodiversity by 2050, adding to damage from pollution and forest clearance to make way for agriculture, according to more than 550 experts in a set of reports approved by 129 governments.

“Biodiversity, the essential variety of life-forms on earth, continues to decline in every region of the world,” the authors wrote after talks in Colombia. “This alarming trend endangers the quality of life of people everywhere.”

Four regional reports covered the Americas, Asia and the Pacific, Africa, Europe and Central Asia - all areas of the planet except the poles and the high seas.

For the Americas, the report estimated that the value of nature to people - such as crops, wood, water purification or tourism - was at least $24.3 trillion a year, equivalent to the region’s gross domestic product from Alaska to Argentina.

Almost two-thirds of those natural contributions were in decline in the Americas, it said.

Robert Watson, chair of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), said biodiversity was not only about saving rare butterflies, trees, birds or rhinos.

While that was important, he told Reuters a key message was: “Please stop thinking of biodiversity just as an environmental issue. It’s way more important than that”.

ELEPHANTS AND MOSSES

Among other economic estimates, the Africa report said the absorption of greenhouse gases by a hectare (2.5 acres) of forest in Central Africa was worth $14,000 a year.

FILE PHOTO: Logs that were illegally cut from Amazon rainforest are transported on a barge on the Tapajos river, a tributary of the Amazon, near the city of Santarem, Para state April 18, 2013. REUTERS/Nacho Doce/File Photo

Unless governments take strong action to limit greenhouse gas emissions, “climate change may be the biggest threat to biodiversity” by mid-century, Watson said.

He said U.S. delegates had not challenged findings about man-made climate change, although U.S. President Donald Trump doubts mainstream scientific opinion and plans to pull out of the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

For pollution, eight of 10 rivers around the world with most plastic waste were in Asia. On current trends, overfishing meant there could be no exploitable fish stocks in the Asia-Pacific region by mid-century.

Around the world, ever more animals and plants were under threat from human activities, ranging from elephants in Africa to rare mosses and snails in Europe, the study said.

“By 2100, climate change could ... result in the loss of more than half of African bird and mammal species,” said Emma Archer of South Africa, the co-chair of the African assessment.

Rising human populations in many developing nations would require new policies, both to protect nature and to meet U.N. goals of eradicating poverty and hunger by 2030.

In Europe and Central Asia, wetlands have declined by half since 1970, threatening many species.

Amid the gloom, there were some bright spots.

Forest cover had risen by 22.9 percent in China and other nations in northeast Asia between 1990 and 2015. Parks and other protected areas were expanding in many regions, including the Americas and Asia-Pacific.

And populations of animals such as the Iberian lynx, Amur tiger and far eastern leopard were coming back from the brink of extinction thanks to conservation.

MS drug hope for secondary-progressive stage

SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY-Siponimod is a pill taken once a day

23 March 2018

A study of a new drug to treat advanced cases of multiple sclerosis suggests it may be possible to delay progression of the disease in the short term, although the effects were small.

In a trial of 1,327 people, in The Lancet, 26% saw their disability worsen after three months taking siponimod compared with 32% taking a dummy drug.

No drugs currently exist for secondary-progressive multiple sclerosis.

An MS expert expressed caution, saying other new treatments were still needed.

About 100,000 people in the UK have MS - a lifelong, progressive condition. Most are diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 70.

MS affects the central nervous system and can cause problems with:

• vision
• balance
• fatigue
• stiffness
• memory

Most cases start as relapsing-remitting MS and most of these develop into secondary-progressive MS within 15-20 years.

'Modest effect'

Patients in this trial, which was funded by drug company Novartis, had had MS for an average of 17 years - four years with secondary MS, the advanced stage.

Most needed assistance with walking before the trial began.

When standard measures of disability were used to track their progress, there was a 21% lower risk of walking or arm movements getting worse for those given the drug, compared with those taking the placebo.

But the international research team found the drug had no effect on maintaining patients' walking speed and it had some side-effects, although it was still thought to be safe.

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Lead author Prof Ludwig Kappos, from the University of Basel, said: "Although the results are not as good as we wanted to see, it is a very large study, which is robust.

"It means siponimod is one option to delay the disease in the advanced stage."

Dr Susan Kohlhaas, director of research at the MS Society, said: "These results bring us closer to the first ever treatment for people with secondary-progressive MS - so it's big news.

"This trial showed that siponimod had a modest but significant effect in slowing disability progression, which is incredibly encouraging."

'Disappointing'

But Dr Luanne Metz, from the University of Calgary, in Canada, said a second trial was needed to confirm the benefits of the drug and its impact beyond three to six months.

She said: "Although siponimod seems to reduce the time to confirmed disability in secondary-progressive MS, the treatment effect was small.

"In our opinion... the absence of a significant difference for the key secondary clinical outcome are disappointing results and do not suggest that siponimod is an effective treatment for secondary-progressive MS."

She added: "Trials of other novel treatments that target non-inflammatory mechanisms are still needed."

Before the drug becomes available on the NHS, it would need to be approved by the European Medicines Agency and then recommended as cost-effective by bodies in the UK.

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Sri Lanka: continued Human Rights Council scrutiny needed until justice commitments met in full

March 22, 2018 4:59AM EDT

In this Council, we often talk about the importance of implementation.

We can pass all the resolutions we like, but none of it matters if it doesn’t translate into actual progress for people on the ground.

Sri Lanka’s co-sponsorship of resolution 30/1 in October 2015 represented a moment of hope, of opportunity, the prospect of justice and accountability for the tens of thousands of victims of the country’s brutal civil war.

In that resolution, Sri Lanka pledged to set up four transitional justice mechanisms to promote “justice, reconciliation and human rights” in the country. These included an accountability mechanism involving international judges, prosecutors, and investigators; a truth and reconciliation mechanism; an office of missing persons; and an office for reparations.

Thus far only the Office of Missing Persons (OMP) has been set up – just ahead of the current session in Geneva.

There is little progress on the three other promised mechanisms.

Nor has the government delivered on its promise to repeal the abusive Prevention of Terrorism Act. The Special Rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, after his visit last year noted that the “use of torture is deeply ingrained in the security sector.”

The government-appointed Consultation Task Force conducted extensive nationwide consultations on the transitional justice mechanisms. Its January 2017 report, containing detailed recommendations drawn from all affected communities including the security services, provided an important blueprint for the way forward, but has languished on the shelf, again representing a missed opportunity, and translating hope into mistrust.

Mr. President, we all want Sri Lanka to be a success story. We all need Sri Lanka to be a success story. But it risks becoming a Council failure, fueling disillusionment and discontent, if human rights are sidelined in the name of perceived political expediency, if the Council’s attention moves onto other issues while the promise of justice remains unfulfilled.

The Sri Lankan government should present a time-bound implementation plan to carry out its pledges to this body, and the Council needs to maintain scrutiny until Sri Lanka’s commitments are met in full.

Sri Lanka’s long-term peace and stability hinges upon the international community’s willingness to support the government in addressing the past so that it may look to the future. 

Japanese Envoy says No to foreign judges

Jordana Narin--Thursday, March 22, 2018

Japanese Ambassador to Sri Lanka Kenichi Suganuma said yesterday that his government was not of the opinion that foreign jurists should be brought to Sri Lanka to evaluate claims of human rights violations.

Responding to a reporter’s question about the matter, Ambassador Suganuma said the Sri Lankan government has the capability to investigate alleged violations and bring those involved to justice.

UNHRC Resolution 34/1, to which Sri Lanka was a signatory in 2017, provides for foreign participation in the country’s post-war accountability and reconciliation process.

The involvement of foreign jurist to investigate whether human rights violations took place in the last phase of the country’s twenty-six- year civil war has been requested by many in the international community, as well as by the domestic Consultation Task Force (CTF) on Reconciliation Mechanisms appointed by the Prime Minister.

Ambassador Suganuma also said that he believed the Sri Lankan government has the resources required to handle incidents such as the recent religiously-motivated violence in the Kandy District.

He added that the Japanese government would offer technical assistant or legal advice only when asked.

He made these remarks at the conclusion of a grant-contract signing ceremony at the Japanese Embassy in Colombo. The contracts, marking the Japanese government’s decision to provide grants for an agricultural project in Ampara and a fishery in Mannar, were signed by the ambassador and representatives of the affiliated Sri Lanka NGOs.

Speaking on the projects, Ambassador Suganuma said, “We are advocating inclusive development for the country.”

The first project, for the rehabilitation of a tank in the conflict-affected Ampara District, is to be implemented by the Child Rehabilitation Center with a grant of USD $134,448 (approximately Rs. 20.2 million).

Through the renovation of the Koongaswewa Tank in the district, the project aims to improve the livelihood of 3,120 community members in 780 families, including IDPs (internally displaced persons) and low-income farmers. The second project, for the improvement of sundried fish production by low income women in Mannar, is to be implemented by the Soba Kantha Environment Management and Community Development Foundation with a grant of USD $78,364 (approximately Rs. 11.8 million).

This project will provide dried fish production facilities to the women’s group, benefitting around 60 women and their families, as well as support fish waste disposal methods, thereby improving the hygiene, sanitation, and environment around the facilities.

Set timeframe to implement UN resolution: Canada urges SL

2018-03-22

The Canadian Government today urged the Sri Lankan government to set a time-bound strategy for full implementation of the UN Resolution, with technical support from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

“We call on Sri Lanka to meet its domestic and international human rights obligations to ensure a peaceful, reconciled and prosperous future for all Sri Lankans,” it said in a statement.

Canada welcomed the High Commissioner’s Representative’s report on Sri Lanka and aid it supports the government’s constructive engagement with the OHCHR.

“We acknowledge the initial steps taken on human rights and welcome the establishment of the Office of Missing Persons. We call for its full operationalization and implementation,” it said.

It said the Wednesday’s report at the 37th UNHRC session in Geneva  highlighted that continued effort is needed on transitional justice, including reparations, truth seeking and accountability mechanisms and on implementing confidence-building measures critical to reconciliation such as repeal of the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

Tamil journalist detained and harassed by Sri Lankan Army while reporting in Mullaitivu

22Mar 2018

A Tamil journalist was detained by the Sri Lankan army and subject to threatening and abusive language by an army official while reporting on the army’s plans to appropriate land in Mullaitivu.

The journalist who had been working in Alampil, were residents have reported that the Sri Lankan Army is attempting to permanently seize the land of a destroyed LTTE cemetery was stopped and questioned by soldiers.

When the journalist refused to hand over his camera to be searched, he was taken aside and interrogated by a higher ranking officer who implied that his days were numbered and also subjected him to verbal abuse.

The journalist was released after an hour and a half.

Related Articles: 

22 March 2018 : Army attempts to appropriate destroyed LTTE cemetery, angering Mullaitivu residents

12 December 2017 : What media freedom? - Jaffna Press Club condemns military repression of Tamil journalists

10 December 2017 : Sri Lankan army detains Tamil journalists documenting Sinhalisation in Mullaitivu

10 December 2017 : Tamil journalist attacked in Mullaitivu

Will President Srisena Respond To Little Girl’s Sorrow?

By Stanislaus Celestine –MARCH 22, 2018

Stanislaus Celestine

Day before yesterday,(19.03.2018) the entire tamil community around the world witnessed a heart rending incident that took place in Kilinochchi, Sri Lanka.

One Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan was arrested in 2008 under the Prevention of Terrorism Act of Sri Lanka and the duty to look after his two little children went to his wife , Yogarani who had no permanent job to support themselves financially. Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan, after the criminal proceedings against him, was found guilty to the charges and sentenced to life Imprisonment by a high court and thus has been serving his life sentence in prison.

Things went from bad to worse when his wife, Yogarany died recently due to sicknesses. Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan was allowed to participate at his wife funeral ritual in Kilinochchi and after that ritual prison and police officials informed him that it was the time for him leave and proceed to the prison. When Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan went to get in the prison vehicle, his daughter, probably around 10 years old, who grew up without her father’s love with the support of her beloved mother who too left her permanently, refused to leave her father and without realizing the consequences, that little girl decided to go with her father in the prison vehicle to the prison and live there. The photographs and video footage recording this pathetic tragedy went viral yesterday and all the people who came to know about this felt bad and started to blame the Good Governance and the Tamil Politicians, especially the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) which was widely criticized for indiscriminately supporting this Maithri-Rani Government.

Tamil people, who were instrumental in bringing HE President Maithripala Srisena into power, with a lot of anticipation expect HE President Maithripala Srisena, who is known and seen as a simple and kind hearted president, to grant a pardon to this ill fated Sri Lankan Tamil, Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan by virtue of his powers vested under Article 34 of the Constitution of Sri Lanka.

The Article 34 of the constitution of Sri Lanka is reproduced here.

Grant of pardon

34. (1) The President may in the case of any offender convicted of any offence in any court within the Republic of Sri Lanka –

(a) grant a pardon, either free or subject to lawful conditions ;

(b) grant any respite, either indefinite for such period as the President may think fit, of the execution of any sentence passed on such offender ;

(c) substitute a less severe form of punishment for any punishment imposed on such offender ; or

(d) remit the whole or any part of any punishment imposed or of any penalty or forfeiture otherwise due to the Republic on account of such offence:

Therefore, the HE President Maithripala Srisena has enough legal powers in this regard and it is matter of time for the president to make a determination as to whether he should grant a pardon on Sachchithanantham Ananthasuthaharan.

If anyone asks a question so as to whether this is an exceptional case, my answer is Yes…A BIG YES…

My point on this matter will be justified in the following case law where Justice, Raja Fernando observed a similar concept in relation to what is an exceptional situation.

Under the laws of Sri Lanka, certain offenses have been classified as serious offenses and any bail application on behalf of such accused can not be entertained by such court unless there is an exceptional circumstance established by such accused through his petition.

In the Court of Appeal Case of CA (PHC) 03/2002, it was stated as follows:-

“…….Taking into consideration the special circumstances in this case, in that both parents are in remand and that thee is no one to look after the child and also the long period of remand, we enlarge the suspect, Kanathala Sueetha on bail subject to the following conditions”

Therefore, I emphasize that this is a right case for the HE President Maithripala Srisenal to apply his power vested under article 34 of the constitution to grand a pardon to this ill fated citizen and thus make a move for a good and reconciliatory enhancement between the Tamils and Sinhalese one step further.

This post should NOT be viewed from a political viewpoint and I urge everyone who read this post to see this situation on humanitarianviewpoints as a fellow Srilankan citizen .

I always emphasize that Sri Lanka should be a #one and undivided single country and honestly, the Tamil citizen too love this country as much as the Sinhalese do.

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